In case you don’t know why I am in love with this program, let me take a few moments to tell you. First, I love character creation. I love, if only for a few moments, building the back story and personality of a new character. For a long time, I used to have to build these characters by hand and it would take hours per character with two or three books laying about me. Now it just takes my laptop and about twenty minutes. This has been a huge time saver when making opponent forces for our regular gaming group.

That is another of the wonders of this program. I paid the extra $15 to add the entire Pathfinder Bestiary to my Core Rules (which come with the purchase of the software). So I can now customize almost any creature that I want. I can add hit dice, templates and class levels to whatever creature I would like. So, when the players run into a bearded devil (handily identified by the cleric), they might expect it to have a bleeding attack and that weird beard thing, but they probably wouldn’t expect it to also have a couple of barbarian levels complete with rage abilities. I love the diversity that it allows me to throw at the players, which keeps them on their toes.

I can then take these newly modified monsters and output their created data in lots of useful formats. Obviously there is its own format, but it can easily be saved in XML to be edited later. You can also output the character data as plain text, BBCode, html or WikiText. This format ends up being identical to the format used in the Pathfinder Bestiary. This is super useful if I am running custom bad guys alongside stock monsters.

There is some functionality that I have not attempted to utilize yet. According to the fine folks at Lone Wolf, I can edit pretty much anything in the software to reflect our houserules. For example, at our table we give fighters 4+Int skills per level, rather than 2+Int, and we give extra iterative attacks one point of BAB early. I could go in and make these changes to my software so that it can reflect our table’s preferences. It also is supposed to allow me to custom create classes and creatures. I’ve not needed to do any of that yet, but I like that it is available. However, having not done any of this, I cannot say whether this is a simple and clean process or a cludgy and complex one.

Lastly, Lone Wolf is continually expanding the software and doing so without charging an arm and a leg. At least in my opinion, the software and expansions are very reasonably priced and very simple to acquire. Looking at the post over in Paizo’s forum, you can see what their future plans are for Hero Lab.

In short, I really like this program and I know that it has really enhanced my gaming experience. I don’t have any ties to Lone Wolf or Hero Lab other than being a now loyal customer. You can download and purchase Hero Lab here.

As you might already be aware, full-casters are generally much more powerful than non-casters and druids are pretty solidly powerful, even among full-casters.  Pathfinder has done well (in my opinion) of powering down druids, but one-on-one, a druid is still more powerful than an evenly leveled fighter.  The animal companion plus summoning spells make them a more than formidable adversary.  So why bother with fighters when you can just raise armies of druids (and clerics and wizards)?

Our first problem when answering this question is that, in Pathfinder, your basic NPCs are given the stat array 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8 with no mention of how those stats should be best arranged.  With this we concluded that it is more-or-less evenly distributed, with one in six people having any particular stat be that 13.   Since a 13 wisdom will let you cast 3rd level spells as a druid or cleric, wouldn’t 16% of the population be prime candidates for militarized divine spellcasting? And another 16% primed to be wizards?

The second problem we run into is that we have no built in controls on how common the various heroic PC classes are.  The rules make vague statements that most people fall into one of the NPC classes (commoner, warrior, expert, aristocrat and adept) but there is no hard and fast rule saying that they can’t be of heroic PC classes.  Gone are the 1e days of stat requirements to play classes (17 charisma to be a paladin, anyone?) so why not take a level in ranger or barbarian or fighter instead of warrior?  Why not take cleric levels instead of  adept?  What makes the NPCs take NPC classes?

This kind of thinking leads toward an end that we, as our gaming group, do not desire: the Tippyverse.  If you frequent the Giant in the Playground message boards, you may have heard of the DnD universe created by the poster Emperor Tippy.  For those of you who haven’t heard, this thread explains it relatively well.  Basically it is a world were RAW is Law and the logical extensions of a world wherein magic exists and costs nothing but time and coin are explored.  It’s a magocracy to the Nth degree.  Our group does not want this.  So how do we fix it?

My first solution to this conundrum was to decide that the stat arrays were not evenly distributed.  In a pseudo-medieval society, your basic person is going to be best served by a high constitution.  Yes in a magical setting, clerics, bards, druids and adepts exist and can cast curative spells, but they aren’t around all the time and not every midwife has levels in them.  People die from injury and disease.  Those who have that 8 in constitution are much more likely to die than the ones with their 13 there.  Secondly, because every street corner doesn’t have a wizard on it offering to solve your problems with a few arcane spells, manual labor still needs to be done.  Fields need to be plowed; tools need to be made; things need to be lifted and carried; a decent strength score is probably well prized among the common folk.  Essentially, natural selection has made it such that the stat arras are skewed towards the physical stats rather than the mental ones.

The second solution that I arrived on (which still is contended by Wolfgod) is that the PC classes are just less common.  My reasoning is that, even though as players we think, “I want to be a cleric” or “I’d like to play a barbarian this time”, the people in the world don’t make that conscious decision.  They simply do stuff and then their actions are translated into classes, feats, skills and such as best modeled by the rules.  The rules of the game, as I see them, are like the laws of physics in our world.  Physics does not force an object to fall when I drop it.  Physics describes how the object fell and can help me predict what other falling objects will do based on centuries of data.  In the same way, being a fighter or cleric or druid was not a conscious decision by the character, but rather a reflection of the decisions that he made in his life.  With this outlook in mind, the NPC classes are just easier to fall into.  It’s easier for your average soldier to have made decisions that made him a warrior instead of a fighter or for your skillful NPC to be an expert rather than a rogue.  My basic viewpoint is that not all priests are clerics and not all soldiers are fighters.  Most are NPCs and a select few are specialized PC classes.

With these two constraints in mind, we have gone to building the various armies.  We are still hammering out the finer points and balance issues, but our basic conclusion was that the vast majority of an army needs to be made up of rank-and-file guys with spears (or swords or whatever) and that spell slingers are a small minority.  We are setting a fluid limit of no more than 5-10% of your force can be casters and I would eventually like to see a rule that states how many of your infantry need to be warriors instead of fighters/rangers/barbarians/paladins.

If you have any comments or advice on how best to achieve our desired low-medium magic world, I’d love to hear them.  We are always looking to make our world fit our vision for it and would like to have reasons why it has developed and remained that way.

In short: The Summoner acts somewhat like the arcane version of the Druid.  Instead of an animal companion, however, he has a mutated Outsider called a Eidolon.  The Eidelon can appear in one of three forms: quadruped, biped, or serpentine.  Every level, the summoner can spend evolution points on the Eidelon to give them any number of abilities such as flight, tentacles, poison, or extra limbs.  The Summoner also gains the ability to cast Summon Monster as a spell-like ability, gaining the ability to cast higher incarnations of that spell as he levels.  To round things out, the Summoner has a small spell list, and 1d8 HD.

My Playtest builds: Our plan was to run some combat at level 10, and some at level 15.  Other group members took the other new classes, and we built them with a standardized stat array and set amount of equipment.  I went about creating my Summoner and his pet Eidolon.  The Summoner is a CHA-based caster, so I went with a Halfling.  I rolled really well on my HD, so I started with 96 HP.  Pretty good, for a caster.  The Eidolon is a couple levels behind me, having only 8HD at level 10.  He gets 1d10 HD, though, so he was pretty tough.  The first time around, I chose the serpentine form for the higher DEX.  I used the evolutions to give him wings, a breath weapon, and some arms.  Soon, I realized I was creating Trogdor.  So, that is what he got called the rest of the night.  His build didn’t work out too well the first time around, so I had Wolfgod rebuild him tougher for level 15.  This time, he was a huge-sized biped with massive amounts of hit points and extra reach.  At level 10, my Summoner was able to cast Summon Monster V as a spell-like ability, and he was able to cast Summon Monster VIII at level 15.  The spell-like abilities can be cast 3 + CHA modifier times per day.  Also, using Summon in this manner allows the spells to stay active minutes per level instead of rounds per level.  However, the Summoner can only have one Summon spell-like ability active at any given time.  The Summoner also has the Summon spell on his spell list, but it trails behind the spell-like abilities by a few levels.  At 10th level, the highest Summon spell on my spell list was Summon Monster IV, and at 15th my highest was Summon Monster V.

Combat Summary: For our first 10th level fight, we took on 3 fire giants.  We dispatched them rather quickly, without too much effort.  The next fight was supposed to be much harder — a fight against a CR16 Ancient Black Dragon.  We got owned.  Not just owned, pwned.  The Eidolon failed his save vs fear, and kept failing it.  The high point was when my summoner had all of his high-level Summon‘s in play, and relied on a Summon Monster IV Hound Archon to flank.  The dragon then tried to teleport out, but got bitten on the butt by my Hound Archon (he only hit on 20′s), which prevented the dragon from teleporting out.  Then, he proceeded to crit again the next round.  For our last fight, we were up against 5 demons — – 3 Vrocks, a Nalfeshnee, and something else (I don’t remember).  The Eidolon soaked up damage and blocked against charges, and a Greater Earth Elemental was called to do some damage to a caster across the map.  That encounter was relatively easy.

My Impressions: I enjoyed playing him, but eventually came to the conclusion that the Summoner is too powerful.  My Summoner never actually got into combat, despite his high amount of HP.  The class could easily be split in half, giving one version the Summon Monster spell-like abilities, and the other gets the Eidolon, and both options would still be slightly overpowered.  That’s when you know you have an overpowered class — when even half of it is too powerful.  The Summoner is essentially a walking party in himself, for he can easily summon a creature to perform whatever action needs to be performed.  Who needs a cleric when you can summon an Archon?  Who needs a rogue when you can summon a dire weasel to trigger all the traps for you?

I didn’t take an in-depth look at this, but the summoner seems more powerful than the Druid.  The Druid may be similar in base progression and raw ability, but he doesn’t have the same scalability.  The druid’s animal companion is similar to the Eidolon in HD, but is usually a non-magical beast, and doesn’t have near the same versatility.  The Druid can summon beasts of a slightly higher level, but the magical side of the Eilodon and Summon spell-like abilities of the Summoner still tip the scales in their favor.  The Druids get Wild Shape, but still, that would put them in harm’s way instead of staying out of the way like the Summoner.

Also, the Eilodon is needlessly complex and somewhat silly.  I would have preferred to be able to call a specific elemental as a swift action, instead of having a lumbering, tentacled thing following me around all day (the Eidolon takes 1 minute to summon, so it’s not like you can wait until you’re in combat).  Sure, it’s good to have a large, customized beast on your side, but not necessary.  In one combat, my Eidolon failed a saving throw after he had been buffed, and spent the rest of the combat invisible, immune to acid damage, and cowering in fear.

We like the summoner overall, it just needs to be pared down some.

Can’t I just cast like everybody else?

On paper, the Alchemist looked interesting – bomb-throwing, funny-sounding infusions, lots of custom rules.  Basically, it’s a replacement Bard – a limited arcane caster (who doesn’t *really* cast as such, he brews) who operates as a support character with some combat capabilities delineated later.   I skimmed all the classes and the Alchemist was the one I decided I wanted to playtest.

In practice, it gave me a headache.  I understand the urge to build a non-casting caster, but I ended up having to study for some time just to figure out how to make the class work.  (Not study to optimize, just to play, and I’ve played a lot of classes).

Mutagens – wouldn’t touch them.  I’m sure some players will want to build a self-only casting physical-stat booster who wades into melee despite a medium BAB, simple weapons and light armor – but not me.   (Also, I think there are other classes that probably do this better).

The few options to build a party-support character seemed weak – blade poison isn’t that great after low levels and being able to cast my spells into little infusions so other characters could drink ‘em later seemed clumsy at best.

So I built a Mad Bomber.  The Bomb options are kind of neat, though I wish they were a little more divided into Discoveries that Stack and Discoveries that Don’t Stack.  As it is, part of your Discovery stacks, but not the rest … headache.  Bomb damage is about the same as a Rogue’s sneak attack, but is a tad easier to deliver since it’s a Touch Attack and doesn’t require special conditions.  On the other hand, for most of your Alchemist career you can throw one Bomb as a standard action and are kind of wimpy.  I spent the level 10 Playtests wandering around trying to be relevant and getting killed.  I’m pretty sure my level 7 Ranger in our usual Campaign could take this guy at level 10.

That said, in the level 15 playtest I became a B-52.  I could throw bombs equal to my BAB, and with Rapid Shot and Haste (assuming both are legal) I could throw 5 bombs a round – at that level, 40d6+45, all touch attacks, with me needing to roll a 2+ with all but the last bomb against the big demons we were killing.  Considering I could throw various damage types, I could literally carpet-bomb big enemies and kill their sidekicks with spash damage.  At the moment it felt cool because I could finally do something useful, but in hindsight, that’s a tremendous amount of damage output.  (I can’t keep it up long because I only had 24 bombs per day, but still … until I run outta bombs, it’s evil.)

Casting was frustrating.  Because I hadn’t taken the ability to make my personal spells usable by others, I literally could do nothing to help my friends in battle and often couldn’t be effective myself, because I couldn’t hang in melee, had to get close to toss bombs, and couldn’t buff or heal my friends when they needed.  Even if I had been able to infuse my ‘spells’ for use by others, they still had to waste actions drinking them.  Any other buff caster would be better.  I did my most useful actions UMDing wands to help my allies, which was lame.

Recommendations and Thoughts:

I did like the class concept, even though it’s not very high-fantasy – still, a mad bomber is a fun idea, and though I didn’t use it, the Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde mutagen build was at least amusing.

Make NO bomb discovery stack with any part of any other.  Make all the things that modify Bomb abilities that stack into feats – so I can get the increased splash radius or smoke or rapid-fire or whatever as feats.  (I didn’t need many feats, because few of them help me throw bombs, and I’m not REALLY a caster …)

Please, please make the Alchemist a standard caster.  It’s OK to know some magic in order to perform Alchemy.  If you cast like an underpowered wizard, you could use Metamagic feats and items and would be governed by all the ‘normal’ magic rules.  This would make for a much shorter, less complicated character description which can concentrate on special abilities and bombs and not the intricacies of casting without being a caster.  This would make it easier to be a party support character – and much, much more useful without being overpowered.

The Alchemist is enough of a skill-monger to sub for a Rogue, if they could disarm magical traps.  Just sayin’.

Throwing one bomb per Standard action is too weak and throwing at full BAB is nuts if you go for rate-of-bombing.  I’m not sure if there is a proper compromise for this.

And now for the rest of the party:
The Summoner:

A souped-up Conjurer or an uber-Druid – the Summoner is a cool character concept.  Basically, it can pull some magic and a lot of Summoning, plus it has a seriously heavy ‘pet’ that’s a mutable outsider – basically build-a-monster that is your Summoner’s loyal servant – called an Eidolon.

Oh, my.  After the playtest, we all agreed our Summoner was easily the most powerful character on the battlefield even though the Player hadn’t bothered to buy his 10^th level gear and only had a single magic item at 15^th.  This character never personally engaged in combat.  There were some rounds he was magically dominating the battlefield and the Eidolon wasn’t even participating.

First, the Eidolon is WAY too complicated.  I heartily dislike it as character ‘pet’.  I recommend you remove from the class entirely.  The Summoner is powerful enough with spells and their Summon Monster Spell-like ability.

If the Eidolon can’t be gotten rid of, please consider making ‘Eidonlon Master’ it’s own class – because, really, the guy controlling it doesn’t NEED spells of his own – or, at the very least, making it a ‘track’ of Summoner ALTERNATIVE to Summon Monster(Sp); having both of these was just amazingly powerful.

I liked the idea of the Summoner, but would modify it.  First, I’d make the Summon Monster(Sp) creatures individuals – you’re summoning the same monster(s) every time, so you build a relationship (and might be able to upgrade) your critters.  We thought it’d be cool if, for example, at 1-4 you can summon one Elemental, then at 5-8 two types, then 9-12 three, and so forth.  By 16^th level you could summon whatever elemental type you needed, and perhaps might have upgraded your extraplanar allies a bit with feats or items.  Seemed like a cool class different enough from a Druid to make them worth playing.

Overall, cool character concept, but the Eidonlon and SM(Sp) combination is ugly.

The Inquisitor:

Imagine a smoothed-out multiclass between Cleric and Ranger (with a dash of Paladin) and you’ve got something like an Inquisitor.  Limited casting (more Bard, not Pally), Cleric-ish selection of weapons, and some cool abilities.  Could sub for a Ranger or Pally or light support caster.

This class seemed pretty good from my side of the table.  He needed a Battle Buddy to really use his powers, but did well in Melee and later on tossed some handy spells.   We didn’t notice any abilities or skills that seemed over or underpowered, though anything ‘Teamwork’ seemed a bit weak.

The Witch:

Basically another heavy-caster class, like a Wizard or Sorc; the Witch (A Witch!) has a few special abilities and less of a direct-damage casting list.

Not too shabby – like most power casters, struggled a bit to hit her stride, but contributed a LOT to the battles and was generally liked – except the NAME.  First, ‘Witch’ makes everybody assume a female character, and second, ‘A Witch’ causes spontaneous Monty Python and the Holy Grail quoting, which chews up game time every time it happens. 

The Cavalier:

A dedicated mounted fighter focused on lance charges and with banners to boost his allies, the Cavalier is distantly related to the old 1st Edition Cav.

Oh, the poor Cavalier.  Of all the classes we tested, this was the only one I think we’d reject completely.  The Cavalier is WAY too dependent on horses and charging.  The poor Cavalier was the most prone to be killed or badly wounded.  Fighting a dungeon crawl without a mount was crippling.

I played a Cavalier back in 1^st edition and loved him.  Right now, there’s really no reason not to play a Fighter instead.

Suggestions (radical):  Repurpose this class.  Were it me, I’d make them a non-magical buffer like a Bard who can fight well in melee – Cavaliers Lead the Way or something like that.  Possibly Morale boosting abilities for all allies in 30’ on a Charge OR when set to Receive a Charge.  (Radius increases when mounted or something).  Morale bonuses to Save if they make a save or Crit if they Crit.  Their mount and allies mounts should be able to charge further.  The ability to take a Monster Mount at high levels.

Their abilities – whatever they are – need to work on foot and mounted, or they swap abilities when on foot or mounted, or as a last resort, give them two Cavalier tracks, one specializing in being mounted, the other for being afoot.

Finally, if you’re going to tie most of their combat power to a mount, you’ve got to make sure they can keep their mount with them.  What happens when the Cavalier has to adventure underwater?  In a narrow hallway?  I’d let them magically summon their horse.

The Final Word:

OK.  I’m a High-Fantasy, Low Magic kind of player in general, a roleplayer who rarely min-maxes and doesn’t much care for multiclassing for optimization.  That said, there’s little among these classes that appeals to me.  I’d ban Summoners outright from my campaigns without major changes to their Eidolon and power level.  I doubt many would play an Alchemist or Cavalier without minor changes to the first and major to the second.  Right now the Inquisitor and Witch would fit into my Campaign setting and games just fine.  Wish we’d gotten to test the Oracle …

Mainly, though, all these classes are COMPLICATED.  Some needlessly so.  I realize every class can’t be simple, but Pathfinder has enough shared mechanics in combat, magic and monsters that creating new classes shouldn’t require quite so much mental gymnastics.  I’m not asking for dumbed-down classes, just elegance in gameplay, even if it takes more playtesting and more time.

I’m sure the other guys will chime in with their thoughts, then they’ll send them on to Paizo.  I’m looking forward to seeing the final product!

Halswood was indeed under threat – allies of the Redstone Spur threatened the town.  As you know, Halswood sits on the southern shore of a vast, clear, cold mountain lake, which was once the home of terrible predatory monsters until they were all hunted down by Rhenic some years ago.  At first it seemed merely as if the monsters had returned – but it was more than that.  Great grey fish with massive teeth were again loose in the lake, but they were controlled – by a coven of hags who dwelled in the waters with them.

Worse, Mauril and Athelas determined that these were creatures of the open sea – that had been brought here by some means still unknown to us.  Something more was going on – and we suspected it was going on in the ancient runs of Eriad, on the north shore of the lake.

Our attempts to travel there ended in battle with the hags and their minions.  We managed to defeat the horrible witches, and in doing so, we stole the magics they were using to control the sea monsters.  Using the weapon of the enemy against them, we were able to defeat the largest, strongest guardian set before the shores of Eriad – a massive dragon turtle.

That overcome, we docked out battered ship and scouted Eriad.  Instantly we were set upon by Jarls – soldiers in the service of Redstone – but these Jarls were different; younger and clad in blues instead of reds.  Though the fight was harrowing, we drove off or killed the Jarls – and took a prisoner.

Our captive – little more than a boy – told us there were more of his kind in the ruins, and that they were merely scouts for a larger force.  We resolved to destroy this scouting force utterly, in the hopes that any following force would deem Eriad unsafe, and turn elsewhere.

We approached the stronghold of the Jarls – an ancient temple of Archgate, still standing when all about it was tumbling down.  Knowing we were outnumbered and forewarned that a Druid was leading the Jarl force, we attacked from concealment with Longbows, attempting to whittle down the numbers of our foes.

The Druid replied with lightning from the skies.  We countered, killing more of his men.  The battle grew heated – and the enemy attacked with his most powerful force – a white Dragon.  She was considerably smaller than the great beasts which besiege Tir Castellan, perhaps twenty feet nose-to-tail, but even such a modestly sized creature is a great threat.  The ruins helped us greatly, as did my study and training – knowing that Dragons besiege my home, I have spent the last months seeking out all I can learn about slaying such creatures.  This knowledge and the bravery of my comrades allowed us to strike the beast from the skies – and slay its Druidic master.

The scouting force was wiped out – the Druid slain, his attempt at building a northern version of the Redstone Spur crushed – barely.

I traveled from Halswood to Queen’s Landing, where I am moving my War Griffons-in-training.  With Baron Caig’s permission I am establishing a Ranger station down the coast from Queen’s Landing to train my mounts – as I have accepted a Knight-Leftenant’s commission in the Aruthien army and am now responsibly to raise and lead a company of Rangers.  With Tir Castellan besieged, I know serving my Kingdom is my duty.  I hope in good time I am able to come against the enemies of our home alongside you and father.

in the meantime, I am well – though another message has arrived, warning of some trouble in Caliban.  I suspect I will again be sent abroad on the Kingdom’s business.

More specifically, I rather like the Summoner and the Witch.  I like what they did with the Oracle, but it doesn’t particularly strike my fancy, and I think the Cavalier is a little redundant.  I’ll go into each class a little more specifically.

Summoner: d8 hit die, 3/4 BAB, Strong Will Save, 2 Skill points per level from an odd list (includes UMD), simple weapons, light armor, spontaneous spells from a limited but useful list with slightly better than Bard-ish progression, Summon Monster as a spell-like ability 3 + Cha mod times per day (which scales up as if you were a Wizard casting it) for 1 minute per level, and a bunch of supernatural abilities.

Unique-ish abilities: Starting at 1st level you get an Eidolon (basically a pimped out arcane Animal Companion), which you can summon once per day, and it stays with you until it dies or you dismiss it. The Eidolon improves as you gain levels. Notably, it is not tied to your caster level and does not officially count as a Special Mount or Animal Companion, which means that if you multi-class or enter a PrC, your Eidolon will quickly become useless. So Summoner 20 is pretty much your only viable Summoner build. You can also sacrifice hit points to keep your Eidolon alive (and vice verses at 14th level), which makes tanking a viable option.

The eidolon is my favorite part of this class.  You get a pool of points each level to build your pet.  You give it limbs, attacks, defenses, SLAs, skills and movement types.  As you progress in levels, you get more points.  You can just add new features or you can entirely rebuild your critter.  It’s up to you.  The spell casting is a nice addition, but the real focus of this class is the eidolon and the SLA of Summon Monster that you get.  The summoner’s Summon Monster is a standard action (rather than one round) and it lasts for a minute, rather than one round per level.  So, up to level 10, your summons last longer than anyone else’s (barring Metamagic Extend).  Combats rarely last longer than 10 rounds anyway, so it doesn’t make much difference if your fiendish dire tyrannosaur is there for one minute or two.

There are still some issues to work out with the summoner, such as the ability to summon 7 extra attackers to the field straight out of the box. (Yes, it takes 7 rounds and then you are done for the day, but with the one minute duration, you can summon them right before opening the door to attack the BBEG.)  Some of the “evolutions” (that is, the modifications for the eidolon) are either way too useful or way too useless.  But that’s what a playtest is for.

Overall opinion: Excellent class that I would love to play when it is finalized.

Witch: d6 hit die, 1/2 BAB, Strong Will Save, 2 Skill points per level from a Wizard-ish list plus UMD (does every Pathfinder class get UMD?), simple weapons, no armor, prepared spells from a good but limited list with Wizard spell progression. You also get a Familiar, which adds bonus spells known to your list depending on which Familiar you choose.

Unique-ish abilities: You gain Hexes at 1st and every even level, which are for the most part basically debuff oriented Invocations. They allow a Save, but are Supernatural abilities, so you don’t have to worry about Spell Resistance or AMF.

I really like the witch.  It seems like an excellent, flavorful class.  It seems rather well balanced (I’d put it high tier 3 or low tier 2).  If you play Pathfinder core only (no 3.5 books) then this class fares very well.  If you start bringing in splatbooks from 3.5, then it starts to get rather weak, as it has a unique spell list, with a mish-mash of arcane and divine spells.

One thing I like (and am hesitant) concerning the witch is that its familiar doubles as its spellbook.  This is great, flavor-wise.  The witch doesn’t get its spells through books, but by a commune with a pseudonatural being.  Each familiar also gives the witch a set of bonus spells that differs from familiar to familiar.  The problem is that the witch familiars are no tougher than the wizard/sorcerer’s familiar.  Meaning they die pretty quickly when it comes down to it.  Something needs to be done about this.  I suggest treating the familiar as a summoned creature (like the eidolon, for instance) that you can summon each day as a level 1 SLA.  That way, if it takes more damage than its current HP, it just gets un-summoned and you can get it back tomorrow.

Also, one other problem with the witch is the hexes.  They are (for the most part) excellent buffs/debuffs.  The only problem is that, while they are (Su) abilities, they explicitly provoke AoOs.  This wouldn’t be too terrible if it weren’t for the fact that the vast majority of them are touch attacks.  Not ranged touch attacks, but “walk up to the scary creature with your d6 hit die, low strength, no armor and poor BAB and try to punch him without dying” touch attacks.  This, I am sure, is being changed.  The current fix seems to be that they simply don’t provoke AoOs.  This still means you have to wade into melee but with a feat or two, you can skirmish with these.

Overall opinion: Fix the hexes and I will stat this up as my next villain without any question

Cavalier: d10 hit points, Full BAB, Strong Fort Save, 4 Skill points per level with the Paladin’s Skill list, simple/martial weapons and all armor and shields (except Tower Shield). You get a Druid’s animal companion as a mount (using the same rules) but without the Share Spells ability. You get a some Fighter bonus feats.

Unique-ish abilities: Once per combat you can “Challenge” a foe, gaining scaled Precision damage against them (7d6 at 19th level), but you count as being Flanked against everyone else (buy armor of Heavy Fortification or something similar to protect against Rogues). You must join an Order, and you gain some abilities and roleplaying restrictions based on which Order you join. The abilities are a mixed bag and you generally can’t change Orders without a lengthy conversion, so choose carefully. You also must take an Oath, which gives you a very minor bonus and imposes another roleplaying restriction. At 11th level, you get a free Special Attack (Bull Rush, Trip, etc) when you Charge. At 20th level, your Charge damage is multiplied and Stuns enemies for 1d4 rounds (and notably, if they Save they are still Staggered for 1d4 rounds).

Like I said earlier, I don’t see any real reason for the cavalier.  It’s essentially a fighter/paladin focused on mounted combat.  The orders/oaths are an interesting idea, but poorly implemented, I think.  You get mechanical bonuses for roleplay.  I understand that roleplay is very important.  I am a big fan of it, but my archivist doesn’t get mechanical bonuses for playing him like a bookish scholar rather than a juggernaut of destruction.  The party cleric doesn’t get mechanical bonuses for making sure to face east every morning and bowing to the west every night because he worships the sun.  But the cavalier gets mechanical bonuses for not having sex if he takes the Oath of Chastity.  Bleh.

Other than that, the “challenge” ability seems a little messed up.  You challenge a specific enemy, which lets you toss a couple extra d6s at him when you hit.  However, this makes you considered flanked to everyone else on the battlefield.  Just hope you aren’t fighting anything with rogue levels!  It seems to try to mimic the “marked” condition that 4e introduced, but it does it poorly.  This ability, in my opinion, needs to be completely scrapped.

Overall opinion: mounted combat is too limited in most campaigns to justify a whole base class.  Cut this into a 5-10 level prestige class for paladins/fighters/rangers and I would love it.

Oracle: d8 hit die, 3/4 BAB, Strong Will Save, 4 Skill points per level from a Cleric-ish list, simple weapons, light armor, shields, Spontaneous spells drawn from the Cleric’s list using the Sorcerer’s spell progression.

Unique-ish abilities: You are cursed in some way (blind, deaf, etc) but also gain a special abilities based on your curse (darkvision, tremorsense, etc). You also gain “Revelations” as you gain levels, which are Supernatural and Extraordinary abilities. Which abilities you get depend on your chosen “Focus.” Like the Cavalier’s Order, they are a mixed bag in terms of power level and usefulness.

This is, in my opinion, what the Favored Soul should have been.  Spontaneous divine caster that actually works.  I’m sad to say that I probably spent the least amount of time reading this one.  This is largely due to the fact that this class just isn’t really my thing.  It’s well built and I like that the mechanical bonuses come with mechanical drawbacks (rather than roleplay ones like the cavalier).  No real complaints or suggestions.

Overall opinion: if you liked the favored soul, but thought getting wings was silly, the oracle is for you.

Overall overall opinion:  I like what Paizo is doing with their game.  While I wouldn’t play all of these classes, I do like the lack of power creep and the diversification.  I can’t wait to see their final versions.

I will put up a review of the next two playtest classes when they appear.

The second conclusion that my time in these dank walls has brought me to is that I want more of it.  There is nothing in this world, or any other, that I could possibly desire more than the knowledge contained within this book I carry with me.  But first, I must recount my journey to this point.

After escaping the seige, I spent my days studying in Newholm.  I had desired to study the exclusive knowledges contained within the libraries there as well as testing the abilities I had unlocked.  Even the simplest casting of a spell brought chills to my spine.  When I received word from Holly that my help was needed, I jumped at the chance.  My life had changed much over the year since my exodus from Firforge.

I joined my companions not far from the Spaarthan city of Salynndra.  They too had been informed of disturbances in the area and had come to investigate.  When informed that Holly needed help, we agreed to enter the city and begin a search.  Her message was vague, but word in the city lead us to believe that the increased pirate activity was likely linked.  There is, for those who do not know, a great diviners’ college near Salynndra.  We decided that our best option was to seek clues there.

We sat down with a young acolyte who gave us very little useful information.  That is, until we returned to out inn to discover a note which indicated that things were not as they seemed in the school of seers.  We returned and were able to surmise that Holly was captured there along with several other wizards, while the sorcerers who inhabit the college had been kidnapped and taken elsewhere.

After some brief action which had blood coursing through my veins, we subdued the captors and freed the wizards.  We then went out to discover that the source of the increased pirate activity and the capture of the sorcerers was in a lake in the Tantathian March.  This had us all very puzzled but we agreed that something needed to be done.  So we messaged various authorities of the incident and set out to Lake Fum to follow the intriguing leads we had.

After many days at sea, we arrived in Tir Arnoth and immediately started our journey southeast to the lake.  On the road we stumbled upon a house that we determined should not be there.  We entered to find a man who claimed to be the Fire King, something of an elemental prince or guardinal.  To this day, I am still not sure who or what he was but he knew things about me that he should not have known, which made me more than uncomfortable.  He also entrusted me with mineral nugget deeply steeped in layers of magic.  He said it would right the wrongs of the past.  What wrongs, he did not specify.

I didn’t, and on some levels still don’t, trust him but I took the stone and we journeyed on towards the lake.  Long ago, this lake had been a mountain but catastrophic events not only destroyed the mountain but created a crater that became the lake.  The creature who had called himself the Fire King had said that taking the stone to the right spot in the lake would make things right again.

We set camp that night only to find a group of zombies marching into the lake.  This had me curious and I, with the protection of Alder, went to investigate.  In our absence, Holly – who had all this time been an impostor – escaped with the stone.  We did not discover this until it was too late and no trace of her could be found.  We did, however, find more zombies and the real Holly.  We liberated her and a few more wizards and made our way to the center of the lake.  We knew that the impostor planned to use the stone and we believed it to only work in one place.

We arrive to find her ritual almost complete.  Through the effort of the warriors, she was stopped and the stone recovered.  Most of the wards had been removed from it.  We had surmised that the stone would bring back the lost mountain.  It appeared that the false Flen had planned to do that very thing.  Having stripped the wards, doing so would have immediately bring back the lost mountain, emptying the lake into the surrounding plain, downing or crushing everything for miles.  Also, it would immediately kill us, should we have chosen to activate it.

Rath agreed to ferry the stone back to its creator to see if it could be repaired.  He returned to tell us that it would take a year to fix the magicks but that the crisis involving the other plane was over for now.  There was little more that we could do, so we parted ways.

I decided to come here, to Perdaith, to continue my studies and my experiments.  My studies had gone well but I believe my experiments have only increased my addiction to the knowledge that burns through my limbs with each spell I cast.  As I said in my first entries, I believe that this power will be my eventual downfall.  Now I also believe that I will find that downfall out of my own lust for the energy that both danger and this magic brings me.  I believe, much to my chagrin, that I have become a true adventurer.

-M.E.

We’ve tried several mechanisms to work around this issue – mass Aid Another works, but it feels cheesy – six people are crowded around one guy, helping him be quiet?  It feels wrong even if it’s legal.  Having only one character Aid Another feels more reasonable, but it’s also kind of weak sauce at high levels … oh, boy, a +2.  The guy listening for us has a +18 Perception …

After some discussion, we came up with a possible House Rule – Aid Another on Skill Checks might confer a scaled bonus based on the margin of success.  For example, a Rogue Aids the Cleric on his Stealth check.  Normally this would be a DC 10 for a +2.  Perhaps for every 5 ranks of success, we get another +1?  So the low-level Rogue rolls a 21, and grants a +4 Stealth.  If the same Cleric was being aided by a 19th level Ranger with some Skill Focus, he could reasonably roll say a 38, which would confer a +7 … after all, he knows a lot more about sneaking than the low level Rogue.

It’s a thought at least, and something that might make Aid Another seem like a good investment of an action even at high levels.

The relationship between rider and horse is complex – the horse has a mind of its own, but can be guided by the skill of it’s rider.  So, what if the rider has a special skill, like Evasion?  Will the mount benefit from this skill?

I can certainly understand a ruling that says while the rider might well use his Evasion ability for a reflex save that affects both rider and mount, he can’t very well help the horse dodge.  Granted, but what if we assume for the moment that the mount has Evasion?  If the mount makes its save, would it not also carry the rider to safety in some fashion?

What if the mount is intelligent?  Say for example my loyal War Griffon has Evasion and we’re fireballed.  The Griffon saves … can I fail?

I know the rules as written would simply have both mount and rider affected seperately, ignoring for the most part the complication of riding.  I’m just curious if there might be a better mechanism or perhaps future feat tree that would focus more on mounted combat, or mounted combat on an intelligent mount …

In Tir Ezion I took the small fortune I had earned and invested in War Griffons – six to be exact.  Hatchlings now, but growing and training with the Rystars of Spaartha.  I’ve spent many months there, training the Griffons and being trained myself.

War Griffons seemed a wise idea, with four great Dragons threatening Tir Castellan.  I know full well I lack the skill and fortitude to face such ancient beasts – at present.  But like all my companions, we train and study for the day when we face the great wyrms in battle.  With trained mounts, we could face them in the air, where the Rystars tell me Dragons are clumsy fliers.

Nonetheless, after months of training, a letter came from Holly, the Flen Wizard who had trekked with us across Bravenland in pursuit of the snakemen spies.  She was in some kind of trouble, and had taken pains to conceal it – her letter was written in a code only the snakemen used – a trick which she knew that Mauril the archivist could certainly unravel.  We gathered together again from the far countries where we had scattered, and went seeking Holly.

Having no good place to begin, we traveled to Valeska, to the Diviner’s College there.  Here we paid for scrying – not only in the search for Holly, but also in combating the pirates who had been raiding the Spaarthan coast of late.  As you well know, the Kingdom navies are tasked beyond their capacity these last few months, sailing convoys of troops to Caliban to fight the armies of Manath, and sailing other legions to Bravenland to aid in the war with the Redstone Spur.  It was no surprise then that buccaneers would take advantage of the opportunity.

What was strange were the abductions – these pirates weren’t taking loot, they were taking men.  So we scryed upon them as well – and found little.

However, it soon became clear that all was not well at the school of Diviners.  Being a Ranger has some advantages – I might not know when someone is lying, but I can tell when things are being hidden.

We left the Diviner’s College, discussed our clues – and returned and launched a rapid assault under the cover of Mauril’s silence spell.  We slew the guards and those Wizards who were keeping the rest in bondage – and liberated Holly and the rest of the students who were being held hostage here.

This was not the end of the quest; the grateful Diviners showed us what we needed to know about the mysterious pirates – apparently they were coming from Lake Fum in Tantathia.  This seemed impossible – as the lake is landlocked – but we resolved to go and investigate.

The wilds of the Tantathian March were warmer than we had left them in winter – spring had come to the land.  We scarcely paused to enjoy it, traveling fast down the Kingdom high road.

During our travel we came upon a strange house – which I am sure was never near that road before.  Upon closer investigation, we met the occupant – a strange being claiming to be the ‘Fire King’ – an ancient being who had dwelled in these lands for many centuries.

He claimed to have a solution to our problem.  Raiders were coming through some kind of portal which had torn open above Lake Fum – where an ancient portal had once existed before Mount Fum had blown itself apart and become Lake Fum.  Apparently, this weak point was allowing these extraplanar raiders to attack us.

I was not entirely convinced of the ‘Fire King’ and his story, but it fit with the facts, so we investigated.  Mauril was armed with a strange magical device that the King claimed would slowly regrow the mountain, closing the portal.

We traveled on, finally discovering the portal in the lake.  We fought the interlopers and drove them back through the portal – but the magical device was damaged in the battle, and we couldn’t raise the mountain.  We left a guard on the portal and returned the device.  The Fire King claims he will repair it, and the mountain will be raised again.  We shall see – meanwhile, the raids have stopped, and Spaartha is returning to health.

With that emergency dealt with, I returned to training Griffons in Tir Ezion – until your next letter reached me.